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A a

A
Adenine. A purine base for DNA and RNA that pairs with the pyrimidine base Thymine (T) in DNA and Uracil (U) in RNA. GMW of the isolated base is 135.1 grams per mole.

a.
Adjective. One of the ``parts of speech.'' Further discussion, possibly surprising, at the noun entry.

A
Advanced. A prefix that is productive in the grammatical sense. A temporary attribute. A retarded name, as we would have said (and known) in elementary school). SBF offers an initiation into Advanced Smileys.

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A.
Aeschylus. This is the established conventional abbreviation used by classicists (writing in English) in citations. It doesn't stand for Aristophanes (Ar.), Aristotle (Arist.), or Athenaeus (Ath.). Aeschylus is reckoned ``the father of tragedy.'' Mnemonic for the abbreviation: ``A tragedy should be brief.''

A
Alpha. Not the expansion here, just the FCC-recommended ``phonetic alphabet.'' I.e., a set of words chosen to represent alphabetic characters by their initials. You know, ``Alpha Bravo Charlie ... .'' The idea behind the choice is to have words that the listener will be able to guess at or reconstruct accurately even through noise (or narrow bandwidth, like a telephone). Hence, ``Artisan'' would be no good because it might be heard as ``Partisan.''

Personally, I prefer ``Aorta.'' If they ask you to repeat you can say ``Aneurysm.''

A Greek friend of mine has the surname Petr... He made a phone reservation at a restaurant (in the US), and when he arrived they couldn't find him listed: Because the ``p'' is unaspirated (in contrast with initial plosive consonants /p/ and /t/ in English) they had heard ``Etr...'' For a similar but more widely experienced misunderstanding, see the enema entry.

Å
A metric unit named after Anders Jonas Ångström. It's also a special character used in Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish. For some information about that, see this Aa entry.

A
Amp, Ampere. Abbreviation and symbol for the ampere (also amp), the SI base unit for electric current, named after André Marie Ampère (1775-1836). The electric charge unit is the coulomb, a derived unit defined as one ampere-second (C = A s).

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a
Annus. Latin, `year.'

A+, A+
A-plus is A programming language. It has a strong APL flavor to it.

Michael Neumann's extensive list of sample short programs in different programming languages includes source code for three A+ programs.

A
Arbeitsgemeinschaft. See AG.

A
Arts & Sciences. (Shhh!) For an even more extreme abbreviation of A&S, see NATAS.

A
Assist. Scorecard abbreviation.

A.
Atlantic Reporter. Legal publication.

A
Atomic mass number. The number of baryons (protons plus neutrons) in a nucleus. Numerically close to the atomic mass -- the mass of the atom in atomic mass units (amu).

A
Attendance. Scorekeeping abbreviation, if you're keeping score on what's happening in the stands.

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A.
Latin, Aulus. A praenomen, typically abbreviated when writing the full tria nomina.

There are rather many other words which A abbreviates in Latin inscriptions.

A
Diode imperfection factor. Alternate symbol and name for nonideality factor n. I've only ever seen this symbol used in solar-cell work (the conventional solar cell is a diode). See also A0.

A
Time Zone A. UTC+1. Also called CET and MEZ.

Aa, aa
Aa is the two-letter symbol for Å. (Naturally, aa is used for the lower-case form å.) Å is a special (i.e., non-English) vowel symbol used in all the major Scandinavian languages. It's also used by scientists to abbreviate a metric unit that when not abbreviated is typically written Angstrom. It also seems to occur in some English-speakers' pendants (twice for ANNA). (Follow this link for HTML-related information on the ISO-Latin-1 issues.)

Because of some fussy alphabetical-order issues with å, this entry is probably as good a place as any to discuss the alphabets used in Swedish, Icelandic, Danish, and the Norwegian languages, with particular attention to the special vowel symbols.

We start with Swedish, either because the eponymous Ångström was a Swede, or because Swedish is the language for which I am aware of the fewest confusing details. In Swedish, the alphabet starts with the same 26 letters as the English alphabet, followed by å, ä, and ö in that order. I.e.,

a, b, c, ... v, w, x, y, z, å, ä, ö.

The letters c, q, w, and z occur only in a few names. The letter w used to be treated as a variant of v, and alphabetization usually ignored the difference. (Words beginning in v and w could be mixed up in a dictionary the same way words beginning in v and V can be mixed up in an English dictionary.) Thus, while the Swedish alphabet was (sometimes) read off with v and w separately named, from the perspective of alphabetization, the alphabet was best regarded as just 28 letters:

a, b, c, ... v, x, y, z, å, ä, ö.

In 2005, the Swedish Academy decreed or suggested or whatever that the v and w be thenceforth treated more distinctly for alphabetization purposes, so the w has its place as further above.

In Danish, æ is used where Swedish uses ä, and ø is usually used in place of Swedish ö. The symbol corresponding to Swedish å, and its place in the alphabet, have changed once or twice in the last couple of centuries. In the middle of the nineteenth century, the double-a was often treated as a distinct symbol on a par with single letters like a or b, the same way ch, ll, and rr are treated in Spanish. In some cases but not all, the double-a assumed the same position in the alphabet as å did in Swedish. Hence, the alphabet was either

a, b, c, ... v, w, x, y, z, aa, æ, ø,

or it was

a, b, c, ... v, w, x, y, z, æ, ø.

and aa was alphabetized like a pair of letters a. By the 1940's the latter pattern had become common. In 1948, however, there was a spelling reform that replaced aa with å. The question of order was not immediately settled, but in 1955 it was decided to place that symbol at the end of the alphabet, yielding

a, b, c, ... v, w, x, y, z, æ, ø, å.

This means that the word for river (aa) was once usually near the end of the dictionary (ordbog), then sort of drifted up to nearly the front, and then in 1955 got kicked even further back than where it began (as å). It must be discouraging to be an aa. (Cf. aa.) Just as in Swedish, w was once treated as a variant, and not distinguished for purposes of alphabetization. [Another item that is (or was) read off as part of the alphabet (in English) but which doesn't (and didn't) count equally in alphabetization: ampersand.] Danish practice was officially conformed to the international pattern (w distinct from v) in 1980.

Again as in Swedish, the letters c, q, w, and z are in fact rare. In addition, the x is also rare in Danish.

Norway had a distinct national language at one point, but over the course of four centuries of Danish rule, Danish became the national language -- both officially and for the creation of literature. After Norway finally became independent of Denmark in 1814, there was a broad desire to distinguish Norwegian from Danish, and to recover a distinct national language. It's a long and lugubrious story, but happily for this entry the Norwegians didn't tamper too much with the alphabet. It is the same now as the Danish alphabet, though they may have been quicker to adopt (and place at the end of the alphabet) the letter å. Hence, the order for Norwegian is again

a, b, c, ... v, w, x, y, z, æ, ø, å.

Norwegian replaced aa with å in 1917. Presumably, commingled feelings of pride and resentment must have accompanied Denmark's conformation to å in 1948.

Icelandic has enough letters. Here is their order for the purposes of alphabetization:

a, á, b, c, d, ð, e, é, f, g, h, i, í, j, k, l, m, n, o, ó, p, q, r, s, t, u, ú, v, w, x, y, ý, z, þ æ, ö

I'm serious about the acute-accented characters: floti (`fleet') precedes fló (`flea'). The letter á corresponds to the å in Danish (so á means `river'). The é was only introduced in the twentieth century, to represent a palatalized version of e that was previously very reasonably written je. One is inclined to suspect that they did it just to have a complete set of acute-accented vowels. The acute marks were originally intended to indicate vowel quantity (i.e., accented vowels were of longer duration), but like the long-short vowel distinction in English, that's gone rather by the boards.

This list is a few too many letters long for schoolchildren to sing. The sung alphabet consists only of

a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t, u (or v), x, y, þ æ, ö.

(Although ð is the voiced version of þ, it is considered ``subordinate'' to d.) The letter z was abolished in 1974, but I left it in the alphabetization alphabet because abolished or no, it is part of names, and some people and institutions continue to insist on using it.

AA
Academy of Aphasia. I had the impression that this organization became moribund along with the late chair of its Board of Governors, linguist Victoria A. Fromkin. What was the matter with my head!? Here's the website.

Try also Alicia Courville's Speech Disorders page or the National Aphasia Association (NAA).

AA
Acronyms Anonymous. See AAAAAA.

AA
Administrative Assistant. Someone not a secretary who handles a share (tending toward the more bureaucratic component) of an administrator's workload. Cf. PA.

AA
Administrative Authority. (ISO term, at least.)

AA
Advertising Association. A UK federation of about 30 ``trade bodies representing the advertising and promotional marketing industries including advertisers, agencies, media and support services.'' They have a logo that consists of two lower-case alphas vertically aligned.

AA
Advising Associate.

AA
Aerolineas Argentinas.

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A. A.
Aeschylus, Agamemnon. Standard abbreviation for classicists (writing in English) in the citations of scholarly papers. Yes, it's meant to be obscure. Hadn't you figured that out yet?

AA
Affirmative Action. As in the EE/AA or EO/AA.

The current use of the term affirmative action goes back to a 1965 executive order (EO) issued by US President Lyndon Johnson. The order required federal contractors to ``take affirmative action'' to see that ``employees are treated fairly during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color or national origin.''

As initially understood, if it was initially understood, the term referred to positive efforts by employers (or educational institutions) to seek out and hire qualified applicants from under-represented groups and to be proactive in eliminating illegitimate causes of that under-representation. It was initially supposed that mere outreach efforts would suffice to right the historical imbalance.

The landmark Civil Rights legislation of 1964 (which does not use the term affirmative action) was intended to illegalize discrimination based on race alone (rather than any possible statistical correlates of race) and to encourage recruitment of minorities. When the crucial bills were being debated in the Senate, Hubert Humphrey (D-MN), later to be vice-president in the second, full LBJ administration, famously offered to eat the bill page by page if it led to preferential treatment for blacks. (At the time, blacks were the only group recognized as under-represented; afterwards, other groups were given official recognition as under-represented. This official recognition is not affected by the fact that the recognized group is -- as a mathematical necessity -- over-represented in some other field. It is virtually assured as a matter of probability that all groups are under-represented in some field, so we can look forward to a day when all groups enjoy the protection of equal-opportunity laws.)

Black representation in professional, managerial, and other kinds of employment deemed desirable or high-status had been increasing steadily for a number of years before the passage of equal employment opportunity legislation, so it was reasonable to suppose that aggressive recruiting and the elimination of artificial barriers to employment might substantially solve the perceived imbalance problem. In the event, progress was not deemed satisfactory, and during the Nixon administrations affirmative action took on a new meaning. A series of executive orders, administrative-law rules and landmark court cases led to a system of set-asides and quotas, and a supporting system of official lies and evasions. Concomitantly, the meaning of ``qualified'' was adjusted to meet the psychological and ideological needs of the political moment. People who think of themselves as liberal today, and who curse the memory of Richard Nixon, generally subscribe to the cynical vision of civil rights progress put in place by him.

The contradiction in meaning and in underlying assumptions, between AA as initially understood and as eventually implemented, offers the creative pollster the opportunity to prove any desired thesis. If you want to show that people favor affirmative action, you ask people whether they support the principles of the early, minimalist definition of affirmative action. If you want to demonstrate widespread opposition to affirmative action, you describe the most egregious examples of its implementation and ask whether the respondent approves.

AA
Agricultural Area. Abbreviation that occurs in EU statistical literature.

A. A.
Alan Alexander Milne. His series of Winnie-the-Pooh books began in 1924, with Christopher Robin, the young friend of Winnie the Pooh, modeled on his own four-year-old son, Christopher Robin, friend-at-a-distance of a bear named Winnie at the London zoo. The nonfictional Christopher Robin went on to become a bookseller (cf. Zola, discussed at Aix entry).

Christopher Robin Milne was always uncomfortable with his fame.

The rights to the use of the Pooh characters and images are nowadays held by Walt Disney.

A. A. also got his son a teddy bear. That bear currently resides in New York City.

I wonder if these Milnes are any relation to E. A. Milne, the mathematical physicist and Bruce Medalist?

AA
Alcoholics Anonymous. (Also this URL.)

The same abbreviation is used in French (for Alcooliques Anonymes -- sounds kinda cool), German (Anonyme Alkoholiker or Gemeinschaft der Anonymen Alkoholiker) and Spanish (Alcohólicos Anónimos). The Spanish adjective alcohólico is slightly unusual: since the aitch is silent, the word has an o-o diphthong, the two component vowels clearly distinguished (in careful speech) by the stress on the second. FWIW, when the word alcohol was borrowed into Japanese, the -oho- was collaped into a long o: arukôru.

AA
Alzheimer's Association.

We have an Alzheimer's disease (AD) entry.

AA
American Airlines.

A.A.
American Association. A late-nineteenth-century baseball league.

A&A
Amniocentesis and Abortion. This is really a pro-life shibboleth for amniocentesis. Anti-abortion groups tend to take a dim view of amnio. They figure, if you're not considering abortion, there's nothing you need to know in advance. (Not exactly true, particularly nowadays with in utero medical interventions.)

A.A., AA
Anadolu Ajansi. Normally translated `Anadolu Agency,' which isn't very informative to me. Anadolu looks like it could be Turkish for `Anatolia.' In any case, AA is the Turkish national news agency. It was founded on the evening of April 6, 1920, as you will learn on this page, where the word great occurs five times. ``We are proud to do our share towards globalization with perfectionism, accuracy and speed. ANADOLU is a front-runner in the use of communication technologies for the high-end. WE ARE THE LEADING AGENCY'' and an EANA member.

In one of his books, Bernard Lewis describes, inter alia, the history of newspaper publishing in the Muslim world. I think the book's title is What Went Wrong.

AA
An[a]esthesiologist's Assistant. See AAAA.

A&A
Anesthesia & Analgesia. A technical journal.

AA
AntiAircraft (gun[s] or fire). Or Antiaircraft Arms. Slang equivalent ``ack-ack.''

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A&A
Antike und Abendland. Beiträge zum Verständnis der Griechen und Römer und ihres Nachlebens, Berlin.

AA
Application Association.

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AA
Archäologischer Anzeiger. A German archaeology journal catalogued in TOCS-IN.

AA
Arithmetic Average. The thing usually meant by average or mean, when not otherwise qualified. Dictionaries seem overwhelmingly to prefer the term ``arithmetic mean'' to ``arithmetic average'' as a more specific term, but in ordinary usage ``arithmetic mean'' seems to be not even twice as common as ``arithmetic average.'' Frankly, neither the editor nor I can recall encountering the term ``arithmetic average'' before. The term doesn't seem to be limited in distribution to the RotW (outside North America, in this instance). What probably happened is that google invented 800,000 bogus web pages to fake us out. Either that, or it's a dumbed-down term invented and used by people who didn't absorb (very deeply) mathematics and its conventional terminology in school.

The words average and mean, if not explicitly qualified, both mean a sum divided by the number of its addends. This is, in general terms, a ``measure of central tendency.'' Two other measures of central tendency are the median and mode. One might call these discontinuous measures, since their values are discontinuous functions of the numbers whose distribution they describe the central tendency of. Other continuous measures of central tendency are usually named with the word mean. The most common such alternatives that I can think of are ``geometric mean,'' ``harmonic mean,'' and ``logarithmic mean.''

In Hong Kong, the phrase ``AA <system>'' (with AA pronounced as an English initialism and <system> representing a Chinese or Cantonese translation of the English word system) is the practice of splitting a restaurant or entertainment bill. Presumably this arose specifically from the practice of dividing the bill equally, so each person paid the AA cost. I'm not sure whether the term is still used strictly in this sense or may also now refer to an arrangement in which all individuals pay their own expenses. The latter is called ``Dutch treat'' in English-speaking countries (and ``pagar a la americana'' in South America). I needn't have explained my uncertainties. I could have just said the AA system means ``to go Dutch'' without further specification and left it at that, but I wanted to share.

(In China as in the US, Chinese restaurants usually serve dishes to the table, and individuals serve themselves. Hence, there is only one straightforward way to share the expenses, and no ambiguity.)

AA
(US) Armed Forces (in the rest of the) Americas. Designation excludes US and Canada. This region is loosely called ``Central and South America,'' which technically would exclude the Caribbean and also (irrelevantly for the foreseeable future, though not for the foreseeable past) Mexico. Two-letter ``state'' code used by the MPSA and USPS. (For USPS purposes, US Armed Forces stationed out-of-country are served by ``domestic mail,'' and so require a ``state'' code.)

Mail bound for the AA region used to be (and I believe still is) routed through processing centers at Miami, and used to be nominally bound for Florida. Using FL (for Florida) instead of AA still works for mail, but will probably cause problems with credit-card verification, so don't do it. For more on MPSA/USPS military mail, see the MPO entry.

AA
Associate in Arts. A two-year post-secondary degree.

A&A
Astronomy & Astrophysics.

AA
Atomic Abs. Ventral annihilation. A six-pack of twenty-ounce cans of U-235. Buff b... Oh. Actually, AA is short for Atomic Absorption. Never mind. See AAS instead.

AA
German, Auswärtiges Amt -- `Foreign Office' (FO).

AA
Author's Alterations. Authors' Alterations, if the work is a conspiracy. Changes to the proofs after they're in galley. Doesn't that sound cool and insiderish? It's probably nonsense. AA is changes made to the text that's done up in galley proofs. Book contracts usually have a clause that you didn't notice, to the effect that if AA's are substantial, the author is penalized. I contributed to an encyclopedia, however, which due to time constraints was typeset during reviews. I don't know what they do when the reviews are unfavorable or ask for extensive changes.

AA
Auto Answer. A standard light on an external modem.

AA
Automobile Association. The name of the Automobile Association of Britain. There's also a Royal Automobile Club (RAC), but I couldn't find anything about it using the search engine at AA.

AA
Average Audience. A broadcast-industry variable whose value is a number. The number is not a measure of audience intelligence, average or otherwise.

AA
Double-A. When letters are used to indicate sizes, as in shoe or brassiere sizes, it is necessary to select an appropriate range. As time passes, if the system is successful, it often occurs that the customer base begins to include individuals outside the original range. Since A typically refers to the smallest size (or ends up doing so), something must be done. Hence, AA electric batteries, AA shoes, and AA cup sizes. (Sometimes this repeated-letter scheme is used even though a single-letter scheme is possible. For an example of this puzzling and inexplicable phenomenon, see the grade inflation entry.) Batteries are available down to AAAA at least (vide 9V battery entry); I'm not sure about shoes and bras, but here's the latest information we have managed to uncover on bra sizes.

If shoulders are back in fashion and you're thinking about fixing up your old blouse but can't find the right-size shoulder pad in the ``Home Fashions'' section, experiment with bra cups. This reminds me of the scene in the movie theater from Summer of '42. Now let's get back to...

This just in (from Reuters, dateline May 2003, Taipei): ``Villagers in southern Taiwan are strapping bras to their faces to guard against the deadly SARS virus due to a shortage of surgical masks.'' A local factory is actually recycling its own colorful bras, cutting them and sewing on new straps. I don't understand why the factory has to cut anything to begin: don't they have a supply of cups or something? I should probably say that I will be following this story as closely as is decently possible, but I won't.

The first sports bra was invented in 1977 by Lisa Lindahl, a jogger, and her childhood friend Polly Smith, a costume designer. Lisa's sister dubbed the project ``a jockstrap for women.'' While Lisa and Polly were working on a prototype, Lisa's husband came in and playfully pulled a jockstrap over his head and around his chest. They were inspired, and Polly fashioned a model constructed of two jock straps sewn together. (The story here is condensed from this page.) From (the general vicinity of) athletic cups to bra cups, and from bra cups to shoulder pads, it seems fashion moves ever upwards. The German word for glove is Handschuh (yes, literally `hand shoe').

In the US in 1999, 130,000 women underwent breast augmentation surgery, a factor-of-four increase from 1992, the year that silicone implants were banned for cosmetic use. (In November 2006 the FDA reapproved them for all uses where saline implants were approved.) To any mathematically competent person, it had already been clear in 1992 that silicone implants are just as safe as saline implants, but people are stupid about statistics. Silicone is also more natural-looking unless there's a leak. (If saline leaks, it's absorbed.) During the dark ages (1992 to 2006) silicone remained legal to replace a failed saline implant and in certain other applications. Also, the shell that holds the saline solution in saline implants is made of silicone.

But you know, those implants require more upkeep than the sealed battery on my old Honda, and they don't necessarily last much longer. Research has been ongoing; alternatives studied have included polyvinylpurolidone (PVP) implants and reconstruction using fat from elsewhere in the body. (I guess moving it from the wrong places to the right places kills two birds with one stone. Liposuction is gaining in popularity too, you know.) Last I heard, the clinical trials were being conducted in Europe, where the litigation risk is lower. Apparently the only alternative that has been widely commercialized is the gummy-bear implant, which is an incremental modification of the regular silicone implant: the filling is silicone polymerized with more crosslinking monomers, resulting in a rubbery gel rather than a viscous one.

Sixty percent of women getting augmentation in 1999 were aged 19-34. Thirty-five percent were aged 35-50. (The other 5% includes about 1% under 18.) Often the augmentation is to achieve symmetry or for prosthetic purposes after other surgery. A smaller number of women go under the knife to decrease their size.

Dr. Judith Reichman, regular guest physician on the Today Show, wants you please to understand that ``Very few women do it to please a male figure in their lives. When we say that, we are under-valuing a woman's concerns.'' It's not about that at all! It's about looking good in clothes or looking good out of them. As you know, women dress for other women. Men don't matter. Women engage in competitive dressing -- that's what public events are for.

There was something relevant in the December 2006 issue of Psychology Today. (That should have set off your BS monitor, of course, so you won't be perturbed that the article contradicts Reichman's PC pieties.) It was an article by Marcelo Balive on page 19 (in the INSIGHTS section; you may find it helpful to raise the trip level on your BS monitor) entitled ``A Model Society: South America's Obsession with Plastic Surgery.'' More than half of the article's real estate is taken up by a very informative illustration of Miss Venezuela 2005 Monica Spear apparently literally disrobing. Color caption: ``Latin Americans have won 11 of the last 25 Miss Universe titles.'' In the booooody of the article: ``Although no official statistics are compiled, Argentina is among the top-ranked countries in per capita rates of cosmetic surgery, says Guillermo Flaherty, president of the Argentine plastic surgeons' association.'' The article ends with the recollection of an American woman who had recently lived in Argentina: her gym's locker room was an exhibition hall of breast implants. It reminds me of an American I knew who spent his last year of high school in England (ca. 1979). He was the only one circumcised. I mean, he was the only one who was circumcised. I mean he, oh never mind. He said he felt like an alien -- which, of course, he was.

In theater seating, X, Y, Z may be followed by AA, BB, CC. I'll have to check next time, if I arrive before the lights dim. Dang! I was at an amphitheater that seated eight hundred, and the top row was K. I'm going to have to choose more popular events.

The desire to look good in clothes, and not for a male figure in one's life, is sometimes called the ``Academy Awards Effect.'' Another Academy Awards effect is that the stars who attend them often lack the money or the bad judgment to buy the million-dollar jewelry and hundred-thou duds they wear there. Those're on loan from jewelers and fashion designers, who sell them to customers who only wish they were movie stars. See the AD entry for more on the male figure.

AA also occurs in a kind of positional numbering scheme based on letters. These differ from ordinary positional systems (such as the decimal system, say) because there's no zero. In this kind of numbering, or labeling, X, Y, Z are followed by AA, AB, AC, .... Ordered lists can be numbered using this scheme in HTML (see our example), as well as nroff and troff.

aa
Rough, cindery lava. A term that finds its principal application in Scrabble®. All three major Scrabble dictionaries accept it and its plural aas.

The term was adopted by geologists (C.E. Dutton in the first place, in 1883) from the Hawaiian language. (Geologists like to do that. They adopted cwm from Welsh, when they could have used an English cognate like coomb. Obviously, geologists are closet Scrabble freaks.) In the original Hawaiian, this (aa, not cwm) is spelled a'a. In Hawaiian, Hawaii is spelled Hawai'i. That apostrophe represents a glottal stop consonant, something like the sound that substitutes for intervocalic /t/ in Cockney as well as in some words (e.g., cotton) in much of the US. The name of the capital of Yemen (.ye) -- Sana'a -- has a similar sound.

I wonder if a'a didn't get its name from the sound people make when they try to walk over it barefoot. Then it would be an onomatopoeia'a. No wait, don't blame me, I didn't make it up, honest! Apparently the opportunity to neologize with as many as four or more consecutive vowels overcomes all restraint. See this posting by David Lupher (to the famous classics list) for other examples.

Much nicer stuff than aa is pahoehoe, which has a smooth, lined surface that looks like thick rope or driftwood. It gets this appearance from the cooling process: the surface cools and begins to harden while the interior is still fluid. As the interior moves and drags the surface along with it, the outer surface is stretched, giving rise to the lines. This is possible only if the interior is not very viscous, so it continues to flow even when it is close to solidifying. The smoothness of the surface is also a consequence of the low viscosity (equivalently, the high fluidity): surface tension acts to smooth exposed surfaces, and is most effective when it has to overcome a smaller rather than a larger viscous resistance. Another difference, again consistent with the viscosity trend, is that aa tends to come in larger blocks, while pahoehoe is thin (and fast-moving while molten, get out of there!).

The difference in viscosity that determines whether aa or pahoehoe will form corresponds to a slight difference in silica content, and a single eruption can produce both (usually pahoehoe precedes aa). High silica content (60%) gives a viscous magma and aa. Because the high viscosity prevents gases from escaping easily, this is associated with explosive volcanoes like Mount St. Helens. Magmas with low silica content (50%), like those of Hawaiian island volcanoes, are more fluid and less explosive. That's why the Hawaiians have lots of cool-looking (or hot) pahoehoe.

AAA
Abbreviations And Acronyms. Well, I've seen one instance of this usage.

AAA
Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm[s].

AAA
Against All Authority. A South Florida punk band whose logo is a parody of the automobile-club AAA's.

AAA
Age Anaesthesia Association. ``[A]n association of anaesthetists with an interest in the anaesthetic problems of the elderly, under the auspices of the Association of Anaesthetists of Great Britain and Ireland [AABGI].''

See also John Ascah's Aged Anaesthesia page.

AAA
Aging Active Adult.

AAA
Agricultural Adjustment Act. A New Deal project to limit agricultural overproduction. Some of its more controversial methods were plowing under crops instead of harvesting them, and slaughtering livestock and discarding the carcasses.

AAA
Air Avenue of Approach. Aviation acronym. Duh.

AAA
Amateur Astronomers Association of NY.

AAA
American Academy of Addictionology.

The presence of the above name in this glossary does not imply an endorsement of that last word. The presence of the acronym does not imply an endorsement of the entity, of whose existence, happily, little sign appears to remain on the internet. This page by Steven Barrett, M.D., provides some interesting information on Jay Holder, perpetrator of addictionology seminars, president and cofounder of American College of Addictionology and Compulsive Disorders (ACACD), graduate of assorted non-accredited quackery mills, and apparent inventor of ``torque-release technique.'' Jay Holder is a legitimate holder of a DC degree from National College of Chiropractic, which might say something about that degree. (For some reason, perhaps including the esteem in which the word chiropractic is held, that college has taken a new name.)

AAA
American Academy of Audiology. Funny, I never heard of them.

AAA
American Allergy Association.

They're not trying to promote it.

AAA
American Anthropological Association. Founded 1902, became a constituent society of the ACLS in 1930. ACLS has an overview.

AAA
American Arbitration Association.

AAA
American Association of Anatomists.

AAA
American Athletic Association. Yes, yes, there are indeed Amateur Athletic Associations as well as American Athletic Associations, but there used to be an organization called simply the American Athletic Association.

AAA
American Automobile Association. No one says ``Ay Ay Ay.'' It's ``triple-ay.''

AAA
Anesthesia Administration Assembly. Not a mechanical device, but an assembly within the context of the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA). Founder and first president is Edward L. King, FACMPE.

AAA
Animal Acupuncture Academy. It's about humans performing acupuncture on animals, not the other way around. Veterinary acupuncture. In this context, those who do acupuncture on humans are called human acupuncturists, which under the circumstances is clear enough.

AAA
Animal-Assisted Activities. Human activities assisted by animals, like eating beef. No, no, you know what I mean: seeing-eye dog, hearing-ear dog, fox-hunting. (Cf. AAT.)

Actually, fox-hunting almost doesn't qualify, because the hounds do all the work of pursuing the fox and killing and eating it (except for the comb, mask, and pads, of course). It might be called a human-assisted activity, since a human (the master of the hounds or his assistant) trains and may otherwise assist the hounds -- by, for example, sealing off before the hunt some foxholes that the fox might try to escape to. (They say there are no atheists in foxholes? How could they be sure?) But it is animal-assisted, in fact, because in the classic English fox hunt, the human activity is trying to keep up with the hounds, and horses assist in this activity by carrying the humans as they perform it. That's how I see it, anyway.

Seeing-eye dog work is the only AAA I have even the slightest direct experience of. One day on the main ASU campus, I saw a man a few yards ahead of me, standing patiently before a chain-link fence that closed off part of the sidewalk. A dense traffic of students was flowing around him. I came up and said ``...your dog stopped because they tore up the sidewalk.'' ``Can you lead me around it?'' ``Sure. How does it work?'' ``Just talk to me, and the dog will follow you.'' So we did that, and as I described our surroundings it turned out that we almost immediately overshot his next turn.

The dog's behavior surprised me, because the section of sidewalk closed off was only about four feet in diameter. The street had negligible traffic (it was sealed off by a card-entry gate) and one could actually continue by staying on the edge of the sidewalk or only going slightly off of it on the side away from the street. The dog could easily see how to go around, but was apparently trained not to take that initiative. (I wondered whether the dog conceived the task in terms of a destination and a preferred path, or in terms of an unmotivated sequence of specified paths.) On the other hand, the dog was expected to respond appropriately to its perception of the owner's social interactions. I guess I'm not surprised if dogs are better at understanding social interactions than pedestrian traffic. Still, for a long time afterwards I was haunted by the idea that I might have retrained the dog to overshoot the next turn and then do a dog-leg to get back to it.

The training of a seeing-eye dog has elements resembling the design of an interactive computer program. So many possible inputs! So many failure modes! Actually, the main resemblance to programming is that it rarely works correctly the first time. Both must be debugged or whatever. I gather from what I've read that part of the training involves focusing on isolated situations (e.g., how to exit a bus). So that would be like teaching ``methods.'' It seems that at least the terminology of OOP is a better fit to dog training than to programming. It typically takes about three years to program a new pup into a seeing-eye dog (a/k/a guide dog).

I remember reading a news item some years back, maybe around 2000, about a seeing-eye dog that was abused by its owner and that killed him by leading him into the path of an oncoming vehicle. The dog survived, so I recall. This story has its improbabilities, and it resembles a widely retold joke (in which both dog and owner survive) that you can find on the Internet. I've checked Lexis-Nexis and Google (News, Web, and Blogs) with a variety of search strings, and I've failed to turn up the story. You can take it for what it may be worth: either I have an extremely retentive memory for obscure and evanescent news stories, or I'm a highly creative author of fiction without even knowing it.

AAA
Annals of Archaeology and Anthropology (Liverpool).

AAA
Anti-Aircraft Artillery. Also AA. The most common sense of AAA in military usage. See ack-ack. I heard a troop (that would be the singular, right?) interviewed by CNN pronounce this ``triple-Ay.''

AAA
Archives of Asian Art. ``Archives of Asian Art is a journal of the Asian Society, one of the world's foremost institutions dedicated to building bridges of understanding between Americans and Asians. It provides information and insights about Asia and the Pacific, and offers fresh perspectives on the forces and issues that are shaping Asia's relations with the United States and the rest of the world.'' Published once per year, and an annual subscription costs WOW! I mean, where WOW is 55 euros in the EU and 58 euros in the ROW.

AAA
Area Agency on Aging. Uh, yeah, could you have a look at my knee area? See n4a.

AAA
Association of Authors' Agents. An industry organization in the UK, for collective discussion and representation. Agents must be three years in the business before they can join. (This business of establishing membership thresholds seems to be a book-industry thing. In the US, PEN has a threshold for prospective writer-members. In contrast, to join the typical scientific membership society, you mostly just need a couple of current members to vouch for you.)

If you're a writer looking for an agent, try the Writers' Guild of Great Britain (this link may be more robust), the SoA, or the ALCS. The US organization corresponding to the AAA is the AAR. More general discussion of agent associations there.

AAA
Australian Automobile Association. ``The official voice of motoring in Australia since 1924... represents'' six state-wide motoring organizations and one each for the Sydney area and the Northern Territory.

aaa
Autos, Avus, Attraktionen. (Berlin.)

AAA
Triple-A. A size smaller than AA, q.v.

AAAA
Amateur Athletic Association of America.

AAAA
American Academy of Anesthesiologist Assistants.

AAAA
American Association for Advertising Agencies. ``Four A's.''

Selected Letters of James Thurber, p. 209, has a letter of August 15, 1959, rejecting a request for Thurber to participate in some project of the A.A.A.A. While he pleads ill health and lack of time, his contempt for the organization is not entirely concealed. He seems to go off on a tangent:

... Youngsters now bring babble boxes for me to talk into, as we sink further and further into the new Oral Culture. The written word will soon disappear and we'll no longer be able to read good prose like we used to could. This prospect does not gentle my thoughts or tranquil me toward the future.
  Thanks anyway and I hope those creative spirits learn how to get through to people the literate way.
AAAA
American Association for Affirmative Action. They're in favor of it. See also the CCRI entry.

AAAA
The American Association of Amateur Astronomers. (Here's an alternate link.)

AAAA
Quad-A. A size smaller than AAA. Vide AA entry for yet more profound enlightenment. Some nine-volt batteries are packages of six series-wired 1.5V AAAA batteries.

AAAAA
American Association Against Acronym Abuse.

AAAAAA
Association for the Abolition of Abused Abbreviations and Asinine Acronyms. [Like maybe A7NHY (Aaaaaaardvark No homepage yet). Cf. TLA.] Considerably older than...

AAAAAA
Association for the Alleviation of Absurd Acronyms and Asinine Abbreviations. An international organization ``to tax and control the proliferation of initials'' so we don't choke on our alphabet soup. Proposed in The Economist, in a tongue-in-cheek article entitled ``AA (acronyms anonymous)'' [issue of Dec. 11, 1999]. Amelioration or Abatement would have been better words than Alleviation.

As of January 5, 2004, there were 85 entries whose head terms included the letter A and no other letter. Oh sure, we could expand this number considerably, but we're very selective. Cf. AAAAAA.

AAAAI
American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology. See also FAN.

AAAASF
American Association for Accreditation of Ambulatory Surgery Facilities. ``A voluntary program of inspection and accreditation in surgery facilities to ensure excellence and quality care to patients.'' The October 2001 symposium in Dallas was cancelled. See also AAAC and AAAHC.

AAABEM
American Association of Acupuncture and Bio-Energetic Medicine. Look, why don't you just buy yourself one of those copper bracelets? Convert the money you save into US dollar bills (while the mint still deigns to keep them in circulation) and put a few pictures of pyramids next to your hip.

AAAC
Academic Affirmative Action Committee.

AAAC
American Academy of Ambulatory Care. Related entries: AAAHC and AAAASF.

AAAC
Association of Accrediting Agencies of Canada -- Association des agences d'agrément du Canada. ``To ensure the highest[-]quality education of professionals, the Association of Accrediting Agencies of Canada pursues excellence in standards and processes of accreditation.'' Corresponds to ASPA in US.

AAACN
American Academy of Ambulatory Care Nursing. Cf. AAAC.

AAACRR
Maybe you have in mind A3CR2.

AAAD
American Athletic Association of the Deaf. Old name of the USADSF.

AAAE
American Association for Adult Education.

AAAE
Archives of American Aerospace Exploration. ``[F]ounded by the Digital Library and Archives of the University Libraries of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in April of 1986. Its purpose is to find, preserve, and make available to researchers collections of correspondence, notes, photographs, written or recorded reminiscences, memorabilia, oral histories, as well as any other items that document American aeronautical and space history.'' Hint: not just any reminiscences. Don't call with recollections of your own first flight unless it was so interesting that you got killed. ``The AAAE seeks such collections from pilots, astronauts, researchers in industry and academia, NASA administrators and project managers, and any others who have played a part in the development of United States aerospace history.''

AAAE
Association for the Advancement of Arts Education. ``The AAAE is the direct result of a comprehensive two-year study which surveyed hundreds of superintendents, principals, teachers, parents, school board members, artists, professional arts administrators and community leaders regarding their views on arts education. The study found a positive element for change in arts education priorities and programs in the Cincinnati area.''

AAAH
American Association of Alternative Healers. God help us! -- sometimes literally. Cf. AQA.

AAAHA
American Amateur Arabian Horse Association.

AAAHA
Ann Arbor Amateur Hockey Association.

AAAHB
Reserve this letter sequence now! Five-letter sequences in this desirable region of the dictionary are going fast! Contact the initialism registry today!

AAAHC
Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care. Ambulatory health care: treating the walking pneumonia (and the boogy-woogy blues). Hence, an alternate expansion: A -- A -- AH -- Choo!

Cf. Achoo! -- The Medical Search Engine. (Gesundheit!)

Related entries: AAAC and AAAASF.

AAAHD
Associação dos Amigos do Arquivo Histórico-Diplomático do Ministério dos Negócios Estrangeiros (MNE). Portuguese `Association of the friends of the historical diplomatic archive of the ministry of foreign businesses.'

AAAI
American Association for Artificial Intelligence. AAAI homepage had a nice, understated background texture, and very intelligently included the URL address of the AAAI homepage. AI is a fast-paced field, however, and all that has changed. Founded in 1979.

AAAL
American Association of Applied Linguistics.

The AAAL passed resolutions opposing ballot initiatives in California and Arizona to end the ghettoization of Hispanic students in bilingual education programs, although that isn't exactly the way the AAAL sees it.

AAALAC
American Association for the Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care. Created by the ACP in 1965 to test the waters of the Aardvark region of name space. Alack and alas, deciding not to go the whole three consecutive A's, ACP changed its name to AALAS in 1967.

AAALF
American Association for Active Lifestyles and Fitness. One of six national associations within the AAHPERD.

AAAM
Association for the Advancement of Automotive Medicine. Committed to squeezing your lemon back into shape. Ohnowait -- I should have visited the website first. It turns out they want to decrease the risk of injuries and fatalities. One way to do that: cancel the 45th Annual Meeting, in San Antonio, Texas, originally scheduled for September 23-26, 2001. No final decision on whether to reschedule had been made when I first wrote in this entry on October 9, 2001, but it was eventually held in that city on October 24-26, 2001.

The AAAM was founded in 1957 ``by the Medical Advisory Committee to the Sports Car Club of America by six practicing physicians whose avocation was motor racing.''

AAANA
American Academy of Ambulatory Nursing Administration. For nursing administrators who are on their feet, so far as I know -- no webpage yet. Next time I'm in Pitman, New Jersey, I'll be sure to walk over and ask. Hmmm... there're some names -- AAAASF, AAAC, AAAHC -- in which ``ambulatory'' doesn't modify ``administration.'' Oh! Now I get it!

AAAO
The Alliance of Arkansas Animal Organizations. ``God Bless the Animals, America, and the World.''

Bring back Eric Burdon.

AAAOM
American Association of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine. (No ``other'' in the name.) Aaah: om.

AAAP
American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry. It's got a snappy jingle -- let's go back again! The ABPN offers certification in the subspecialty of addiction psychiatry.

AAAP
American Association of Avian Pathologists. The pathologies, not the pathologists, are avian. On the other hand, the rhinovirus flu that peaks each Winter uses domestic-animal hosts that include not just mammals (especially pigs) but also fowl (ducks and chickens). Actually, the important nonhuman host population is supposed to be in Asia, so for my purposes they're foreign domestic animals.

AAAP
Asian-Australasian Association of Animal Production Societies. Never ``AAAPS'' or ``AAAAP.''

AAAPP
American Association of Applied and Preventive Psychology. The AAAPP has an eponymous mailing list.

AAAS
American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Founded in 1780. Membership by invitation only. Society's journal named after the Telemachus of James Joyce's Ulysses.

A constituent society of the ACLS since 1919. ACLS has an overview.

AAAS
American Association for the Advancement of Science. ``Triple-Ay Ess'' was founded in 1848. Membership by invitation: anyone who can pay the dues is invited to join. I wonder what it takes to become a Fellow. They publish one of the various magazines that have the title Science.

AAAS
Austrian Association for American Studies, founded in 1975. A constituent association of the EAAS. ``AAAS'' is the standard abbreviation, but their name is also (or officially?) Österreichische Gesellschaft für Amerikastudien.

The current (early 2004) officers of the AAAS are distributed among an Institut für Amerikanistik (`Institute for Americanistics') at Karl-Franzens-Universität in Graz, an Institut für Amerikastudien at Universität Innsbruck, and units called Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik (* Englistics -- what a word! what a word!) in Salzburg, Klagenfurt, and Vienna. Recent AAAS conferences (including the EAAS conference 2000, held in Graz) have been in these cities. Why have you got a problem with this? It's a small country.

AAASP
Association for the Advancement of Applied Sports Psychology.

AAASS
American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies, founded in 1948 for the purpose of publishing an American journal in the Slavic field; it was not a membership society until 1960. It grew out of the Committee on Slavic Studies, which was established by the ACLS in 1938, and the AAASS did not itself become a constituent society of the ACLS since 1984. ACLS has an overview.

According to itself, AAASS is a ``nonprofit, nonpolitical, scholarly society which is the leading private organization dedicated to the advancement of knowledge about Russia, Central Eurasia, and Eastern and Central Europe.''

As it happens, not everyone in these areas is a Slav, so the statement constitutes a political, nonscholarly statement that does not advance knowledge. People who think you can't please everybody are optimists; you can't please anybody.

AAAST/APAST
African Association for the Advancement of Science and Technology / Association africaine pour l'avancement des sciences et techniques.

AAB
Allergiker- und Asthmatiker-Bund. (Germany.) Interesting that English lacks a shorter word for ``Allergy-sufferer'' when it has words like hypoallergenic.

AAB
American Association of Bioanalysts.

AABA
American Anorexia Bulimia Association.

AABB
American Association of Blood Banks. ``Advancing Transfusion and Cellular Therapies Worldwide.'' Hemocyte therapy by phone? Cool! Taking ``outpatient'' to the next level!

AABH
Association of Ambulatory Behavior Healthcare. ``A powerful forum for people engaged in providing Mental Health Services.''
``Promoting the evolution of flexible models of responsive cost-effective ambulatory behavioral healthcare.''

Based in Alexandria, Virginia -- conveniently close to the nation's capital.

AABIC
The Association for the Advancement of Brain Injured Children. (``Brain Injured'' here refers to something more severe than an impaired facility for inserting hyphens in attributive phrases requiring them.) AABIC is an organization in the state of Western Australia that is a ``support group for families who have a family member undertaking a rehabilitation treatment programme. The Association also provides equipment, library facilities, incontinence pad scheme and family support officers.''

AABP
American Academy of Behavioral Psychology. Now the AACBP.

AABP
American Association of Bovine Practitioners.

It's good to have a ready comeback when she says ``You're such an animal!'' Cf. AASP.

AABS
Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies. Founded 1968, became a constituent society of the ACLS in 1991. ACLS has an overview.

AABSS
American Association of Behavioral and Social Sciences. ``[A]n interdisciplinary professional society designed to serve faculty and administrators at four-year colleges and universities. The annual meeting offers a collegial forum for participants to share research, ideas for professional development, and academic concerns in all areas of the Behavioral and Social Sciences. Student participation is encouraged.''

AABT
Association for the Advancement of Behavior Therapy. Now the ABCT.

AABW
AntArctic Bottom Water.

AAC
Agriculture et Agroalimentaire Canada. AAFC en Anglais.

AAC
American Anglican Council. The AAC and the ACN are two American Anglican organizations similarly dedicated to ``biblical authority, the Great Commission and the historic faith and order of Anglicanism.'' The AAC is trying to reform (i.e., undo recent reforms of) the Episcopal Church (ECUSA); the ACN is trying to build a lifeboat in case AAC fails and the ECUSA sinks.

You know, I'm really impressed with the passion, dedication, and faith of these, um, zealots, errr, re-reforming crusaders, err, whatever. I'm considering burning in hell for eternity so that they can be right.

AAC
Amps AC. Just like VAC.

AAC
Asia-Africa Conference. This conference, held in 1955, was so important that the name is normally spelled out, so that it is not confused with all of the many other AAC's with which context might allow it to be confused. (AAC? AAC?) In fact, David E. Hall's African Acronyms and Abbreviations: A Handbook, only lists AAC, AAC, AAC, and AAC. All that mutually validating bellyaching led to the formation of the NAM.

AAC
ATM Access Concentrator. Interfaces legacy system to ATM.

AAC
The Audiology Awareness Campaign.

AACA
American Association of Certified Appraisers. Has members throughout the English-speaking parts of North America.

AACAP
American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry.

The University of Michigan used to host a site for AACAP, and still has a useful page.

AACAR
Association for the Advancement of Central Asian Research.

AACBP
American Academy of Cognitive and Behavioral Psychology. Previously the AABP. See also ABCT.

Just offhand, I'd have to say that <americanacademyofbehavioralpsychology.org> is the longest domain name I can recall.

AACC
Airport Associations Coordinating Council.

AACC
Alburtis Area Community Center. Alburtis in Pennsylvania.

AACC
All Africa Conference of Churches. You can't get any web content until you choose English or français (for CETA) on the start page. For a moment, I thought it was the All Africa Conference of Canadians.

AACC
The American Association for Clinical Chemistry.

AACC
The American Association for Contamination Control. The existence of an organization with this initialism and expansion is alleged in a few glossaries and one of that putative organization's standards is even referred to in a .com page, but I have my doubts.

AACC
American Association of Cereal Chemists.

AACC
American Association of Community Colleges. Holds its annual convention in April.

AACC
Anne Arundel Community College. Anne Arundel County is in Maryland. ``Anne Arundel'' is pronounced there as a single word with primary stress on the third syllable and secondary stress on the initial syllable. The county, founded in 1650, was named for the wife of Cecil Baltimore, the second Lord Baltimore.

The county seat of Anne Arundel County is Annapolis, which was settled in 1649 by Puritans who had fled Virginia. They originally called their settlement Providence. The Puritan town successfully revolted against the Roman Catholic government of Maryland in the 1655 battle of the Severn River, but lost its independence after the English Restoration. In 1694 the settlement, which had come to be known as Anne Arundel Town, became the provincial capital of Maryland and was renamed Annapolis in honor of Princess Anne. As Queen Anne in 1708, she granted the town its first charter.

Too little too late, I guess. On Oct. 19, 1774, Annapolis staged its own Tea Party (seems to have been a fad). Once Philadelphia was occupied by the British, the Continental Congress met in Annapolis, making it the effective US capital (all major cities were under British control). Sir Robert Eden, the last royal governeur of Maryland, lies buried in the graveyard of St. Anne's Church in Annapolis; he was an ancestor of the British Prime Minister Anthony Eden. Today Annapolis is best known for the US Naval Academy, founded in 1845.

Annapolis became the state capital after independence. Information on the city is offered by The Mining Company and by Covesoft.

The largest city in Maryland is Baltimore. Further Maryland information in this glossary can also be found at the MD entry.

AACCA
The American Association of Cheerleading Coaches and Advisors.

AACCCM
Anglo-American Cataloguing Committee for Cartographic Materials.

AACCP
Asociación Argentina Criadores de Caballos de Polo. `Argentine Association of Polo Pony Breeders.'

AACD
American Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry. It's a member of the International Federation of Esthetic Dentistry, whose page for it explains that AACD ``is the largest international dental organization dedicated specifically to the art and science of cosmetic dentistry. Founded in 1984, the AACD has over 7600 members in the United States and in more than 60 countries around the globe. Members of the Academy include cosmetic and reconstructive dentists, dental laboratory technicians, corporations, educators, researchers, students, hygienists, and dental assistants.''

There's also an American Academy of Esthetic Dentistry. Go read the AAED entry. If you can figure out from that what the difference between aesthetic and cosmetic dentistry is, then you're a better man than I, unless you're a woman, in which case you're a better woman than I, even if you can't tell the difference (between aesthetic and cosmetic, of course).

AACDP
American Association of Chairs of Departments of Psychiatry.

AACE
American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists. ``The Voice of Clinical Endocrinology® - Founded 1991.''

It reminds me of Einstein's comment about ``hormones of general circulation.''

AACE
AOBA Apartment Community Excellence (award).

AACI
Association of Americans and Canadians in Israel. An immigrants' support organization, founded 1951.

AACM
Afro-Asian Common Market. I found this in the New Japanese-English Dictionary of Economic Terms (The Oriental Economist, 1977). A search of the web suggests that this entity exists only as a vague proposal. The only web instances of the name where it was not clear that AACM does not exist were in Japanese and Japanese-English dictionaries. At least the Japanese is consistent, using kanji for kyoudou shijou (`common market') and katakana transliterations for Asia and Africa (ajia and afurika). These are not ad hoc transliterations: the English words have been adopted in Japanese, but borrowings that have occurred recently (i.e., in the last few centuries) are written in the katakana syllabary (rather than in the hiragana syllabary used for native words). It's something like the use of italics in English to indicate young adoptions like naïve. A borderline case would be the word tempura, derived from Portuguese tempero (`spice, seasoning') in the sixteenth century and now sometimes written in hiragana. Nihon Kokugo Daijiten (Shogakukan) lists tempura (te-n-pu-ra) in katakana.

The same twenty-volume dictionary lists arigato (a-ri-ga-to-u, English: `thank you') in hiragana. There's a good reason for this. Although it is widely thought that arigato is a borrowing of the Portuguese obrigato (cognate of English 'obliged'), it clearly is not. There are recorded instances of arigato from before Portuguese contact, and the Japanese would more likely have been something like o-bu-ri-ga-to. In fact, the etymology of arigato is known, follows regular Grimm's-Law-type rules for Japanese, and is encoded in the two-kanji way of writing the word. (See the 2001 discussion on the Linguist List, summarized in this posting.)

Kyoudou (`common, general') is also written kyodo -- the o's are long, and in a strict version of the Hepburn system I think they require macrons. One of the girls' names that is transliterated Yoko is written with hiragana characters for yo-o-ko, but I've never seen it transliterated (as would be appropriate, just as with kyodo) as ``Youko.'' Probably too confusing.

Shijou (or shijo) has various of the noun senses of the English word market, but common market is also sometimes rendered by the somewhat pleonastic kyoudou doumei (doumei is `union, confederation').

AACN
American Association of Colleges of Nursing.

AACN
American Association of Critical-Care Nurses.

AACP
American Academy of Cardiovascular Perfusion. Visit the website to hear a medley of patriotic tunes.

AACP
American Academy of Clinical Psychiatrists. ``The American Academy of Clinical Psychiatrists was founded in 1975 by George Winokur MD and others (including many of his students). They shared the belief that a wealth of clinically relevant data is available in every psychiatrist's personal practice experience. The organization was created to provide a forum to share information for psychiatrists engaged in direct patient care; and to keep abreast of the latest scientific developments relevant to the practice of psychiatry.''

AACP
American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy.

AACP
American Association of Community Psychiatrists. Hey -- it takes a village. Okay, that was just a joke. Here's the official scoop: ``The Mission of AACP is to inspire, empower, and equip Community Psychiatrists to promote and provide quality care and to integrate practice with policies that improve the well being of individuals and communities.'' My gawd -- they really do want to treat the community!

AACR
Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules. This was not a single standard but at least two: an American and a British version. The current version (as of 2003) is AACR2R.

AACRAO
American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers.

AACR1
Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 1st edition. This abbreviation started to be used when AACR2 appeared. As it is, each update lengthens the acronym: AACR, AACR2, AACR2R... Seems to me we're overdue for ``AACR2R+.''

AACR2
Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd edition. Promulgated in 1978. The same acronym is widely used for AACR2R, a revised version of this.

AACR2R
Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd edition, 1988 revision, prepared under the Joint Steering Committee for Revision of AACR; edited by Michael Gorman and Paul W. Winkler. (Ottawa: Canadian Library Association; London: Library Association; Chicago: American Library Association, 1988.) The current standard.

A very informative web page for a Monash University course explains:

``While the Editors are at pains to point out that it is not a 3rd Edition, some consider that it should have been called a 3rd Edition.''

AACR3
Not-so-fast there, dust boy!

AACSB
American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business. Later officially ``AACSB -- International Association for Management Education.'' In March 2003 I learned that they're giving out the expansion ``Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business.''

AACT
American Association of Community Theatre. (Sic.)

AACT
Apartment Association of Central Texas.

AACTE
American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education.

AACU, AAC&U
Association of American Colleges and Universities. A generous source for empty educationist rhetoric. One of their projects is GEx.

From a faculty POV, this is an organization of administrative types who seek to wrest from faculty types the power to control curriculum, the method being to weaken and de-emphasize majors. So I've read, from third parties, anyway.

Hmmm, les'see here... I notice that the annual meeting of 2006 was held in conjunction with the American Conference of Academic Deans. The conference title was ``Demanding Excellence.''

To judge from its website and publications, the organization itself prefers the initialism with an ampersand. In unofficial contexts, others generally use plain AACU.

AACVB
Asian Association of Convention and Visitor Bureaus.

AACVD
Aerosol-Assisted Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD). Vide J. A. T. Norman and G. P. Pez, J. Chem. Soc., Chem. Comm., 971 (1991). Cf. Spray CVD: C. Roger, T. S. Corbitt, M. J. Hampden-Smith, T. T. Kodas, Appl. Phys. Lett. 65, 1021 (1994).

AAD
Access to Archival Databases. A nightmarishly badly catalogued ``system'' for retrieving files online from NARA, reportedly much better than the old alternatives, if you can imagine.

AAD
Allgemeiner Anlagedienst. (Germany.)

AAD
American Academy of Dermatology.

AAD
Analog-Analog-Digital. Audio CD's may be designated AAD, ADD, or DDD. The successive letters indicate analog or digital equipment was used in the respective stages of production: (1) original recording, (2) mixing and editing, (3) mastering (transcription).

AAD
Australian Association of the Deaf. ``The Australian Association of the Deaf Inc. is the national peak organisation for Deaf people in Australia. It represents the views of Deaf people who use Auslan (Australian Sign Language).''

AADA
Abbreviated Antibiotic Drug Application (to the FDA). As bacteria keep evolving greater immunity to existing antibiotics, we keep needing more new ones. Although bacteria reproduce asexually, they can exchange genetic material (this is relevant in attempts to trace the origin of diseases such as syphilis). Thus, immunity developed by one bacterium may spread to other bacteria. It is especially for this reason that long-term low-level administration of antibiotics to livestock as a growth enhancer is considered a dangerous incubator for immunity. Another use perceived to pose widespread risk is among drug addicts with tuberculosis (TB): TB has a long course, and someone not continuing to take antibiotics for the full term provides an opportunity for bacteria to evolve incremental increases in antibiotic resistance.

AADB
American Association of the Deaf-Blind.

AADE
American Association of Dental Editors. I really don't think you should put a comma after your canine.

AADE
American Association of Dental Examiners. Heck, I know how to do this. Open your mouth. Let me see...yes, yes, you have teeth. Founded in 1882, when this was probably a big deal. Now anyone can do it.

Mission Statement: ``To serve as a resource by providing a national forum for exchange, development and dissemination of information to assist dental regulatory boards with their obligation to protect the public.''

AADE
American Association of Diabetes Educators.

[column]

AADEC
Asociación Argentina de Estudios Clásicos. `Argentine Classical Studies Association.' A member of FIEC.

AADEP
American Academy of Disability Evaluating Physicians.

AADPRT
American Association of Directors of Psychiatric Residency Training. I imagine they didn't have to haggle to become owners of the <aadprt.org> domain.

AADS
American Association of Dental Schools. Now the ADEA.

AADT
Average Annual Daily Traffic. That's one official expansion, but it seems to mean the average daily traffic, determined by sampling or averaging over an entire year, which might be better expressed as Annual-Average Daily Traffic.

AAE
Affirmative Action Employer.

AAE
Alliance for Arts Education. Existed around 1976, anyway.

AAE
American Association of Endodontists. The E-word is calculated to minimize the terrifying thought of root-canal work.

AAEA
American Academy of Equine Art. They don't mean the art of being an equestrian.

AAEA
Alabama Art Education Association. ``[A] professional organization of art educators dedicated to advocating art education by following national standards, providing membership services, professional growth and leadership opportunities.''

AAEA
American Agricultural Economics Association.

AAEC
Advanced Aluminum Electrolytic Capacitor.

AAEC
AgChem Alliance for Electronic Communication. US and Canada agriculture-industry electronic-commerce action group. Working to put zebra codes on black-eyed peas, I think. The preponderance of web evidence suggests that the first A in AAEC stands for AgChem, but the successor organization's thumbnail history remembers it as just Ag.

The successor was RAPID, Inc. Details can be found quickly at our RAPID entry.

AAEC
Agricultur{e|al} and Applied EConomics. An academic department in some schools.

I visited the homepage of the Department of Agriculture and Applied Economics at Virginia Tech in 2003 and was invited to join in celebrating its seventy-fifth anniversary. Eagerly, I followed their link to a history of the department, divided into the first thirty years, and the second thirty years. Uh... Oh, of course, that document is from 1997. Umm... Ah, clarification (inferred from intimations on pages six and seven): the department was founded in 1921, so in 1996 began its seventy-fifth year. Almost. Actually, VT has probably had agricultural economics faculty since 1921 (one that year), and a list of ``Course Requirements for First B. S. Degree Program in Agricultural Economics'' survives from 1924, although there was only one student. It was apparently an optional curriculum within the School of Business Administration. In 1927, a Department of Agricultural Economics was finally established within the School of Agriculture. Documents celebrating the 75th anniversary were scheduled to remain on the website until April 5, 2004. (Ah, what the heck -- leave it up.)

I have to say that we are so used to thinking of education in formalized and institutionalized terms that it is often surprising to return to the beginning and see how loosely things initially came together. Often the most important conceptions and intentions of the initial participants, and basic facts about entities and members, are lost in the recycle bin of history. The history of universities and colleges generally, dating back to the schools in Paris and Bologna at the end of the twelfth century, are similarly uncertain.

The sixty-year history also explains subsequent department name changes:

In 1929, rural sociologists were added to the faculty, and the name was changed to the Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology. The rural sociology faculty were transferred to the new Department of Sociology in the College of Arts and Sciences in 1964, and the department's name was again changed to the Department of Agricultural Economics. To better describe the scope of department's work, the name was changed to the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics in 1993.

So perhaps the ``Agriculture and'' form is an unofficial variant. Whatever.

TTU has a Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, also (as at VT) abbreviated in course offerings as AAEC.

UGA has one too. Oh no! They want us to celebrate their 75th anniversary too: ``The Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics at the University of Georgia celebrates its 75th anniversary in 2004. Professor William Firor organized and chaired the department in 1929.'' Ahh -- now that's the way to do it. Everyone should have such foresight.

Okay, I think I've made my point by now, whatever it was.

Incidentally, I think in most places AAEC is called informally ``Ag Econ.''

AAEC
Australian Atomic Energy Commission. In 1986, the AAEC was formally replaced by the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO).

AAEC
Avid-Authorized Education Centers. Avid Technology, Inc., offers ``Products for StoryTellers.'' It's so interesting that I'm sure you'll be happy to find out for yourself whatever it all is about.

AAED
American Academy of Esthetic Dentistry. A member of the International Federation of same (IFED). According to IFED's page for AAED, ``Founded in 1975, the American Academy of Esthetic Dentistry has members throughout the world. AAED's unique, multidisciplinary membership is comprised [sic, of course] of dentists in the following specialties: dental public health, endodontics, oral and maxiofacial surgery, orthodontics and dentofacial orthopedics, pediatric dentistry, periodontics and prosthodontics, along with general practitioners and certified dental technicians.'' Cf. AACD.

AAEE
Aeronautical and Aircraft Experimental Establishment. (British.)

AAEE
American Academy of Environmental Engineers.

AAEE
American Association for Employment in Education, Inc. They appear to be in favor of it.

Founded in 1934 as the National Institutional Teacher Placement Association. Teachers complain of lack of respect, but it doesn't help when the AAEE describes itself as ``comprised of colleges, universities, and school districts whose members are school personnel administrators and college and university career services officers.''

AAEE
American Association of Electromyography and Electrodiagnosis. Later became the AAEM.

AAEF
Aviation / Aerospace Education Foundation, Inc.

AAEI
American Association of Exporters & Importers. ``The national voice of the international trade community since 1921.''

AAEI
Australian Adult Entertainment Industry, Inc.

AAEM
American Academy of Emergency Medicine.

AAEM
American Academy of Environmental Medicine.

AAEM
American Association of Electrodiagnostic Medicine. Bzzzzzzzzzd-pop! Bzzzzzzzzzzd-pop! Used to be the ``American Association of Electromyography and Electrodiagnosis'' (AAEE). Here's a page served by an online exposition.

Whoops! AAEM namespace is gettin' ta be as crowdid as AAEE! In these hyar prairies, when you can see your neighbah's fahm, it's tahm to move on. Now they're AANEM.

AA/EOE
Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer. This is probably equivalent to EO/AAE, but you better chant all the mantras, just to be sure no one sues the deep pockets off your sorry butt. (See the ADEA for a longer, safer, more ridiculous version.)

Couldn't they just say they obey the law? By pointing out that they obey these particular laws, aren't they implying that whether they obey other laws is a matter of discretion? Did you ever wonder what really would happen if the ob-AA/EOE or equivalent information were somehow omitted from an advertisement? The experiment has been performed! In the August 18, 1986, edition of C&EN (p. 63, center bottom), a help-wanted ad appeared that only described the qualifications sought and instructions for applying (by the following October 1). The vigilant AA apparatus of the employer (Arizona State University) sprang into action, managing to get the following emergency correction into the September 15 edition (p. 64, right bottom):

The advertisement for the position of MATERIALS TECHNICIAN in the ... which appeared in the Academic Positions Section of the August 18, 1986 issue of Chemical and Engineering News inadvertantly [sic] did not include the facts that Arizona State University is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer and minorities are encouraged to apply. Application deadline extended to October 15, 1986 or until filled. Submit resume and 3 references to...

It is certainly true that the AA/EOE status of ASU is a ``fact'' distinct from the encouragement of minorities to apply. Still, the ability to deduce the latter fact from the former would not be surprising in someone with the required B.S. or M.S. degree in chemistry or a related field (let alone the ``highly desirable'' ``experience on the synthesis and characterization of solid state materials, including a working knowledge of crystal growth, vacuum system and inert atmosphere techniques'').

Okay, now for a pop quiz. Everyone loves a quiz! Here are two percentages: 3.0% and 4.4%. They represent the fraction of physicians who were black, based on the US censuses of 1960 and 1990. Here's the quiz question: which year had the lower percentage, 1960 or 1990? Think it over, take your time.

AAEP
American Association of Equine Practitioners. There's no longer a DNS listing for <aaep.org>. I'm worried. Have they gone the way of the AASP?

They're back! Yippee-aye-ayy!!! Cool horsehead-shaped yin-yang logo, too.

``The American Association of Equine Practitioners (AAEP) is the world's largest professional association of equine veterinarians. The AAEP's mission is to improve the health and welfare of the horse, to further the professional development of its members, and to provide resources and leadership for the benefit of the equine industry.''

There's also an international association (IAEP). Donkeys still don't get any respect.

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AAES
[Publications of] American Archaeological Expedition to Syria.

AAES
American Association of Engineering Societies.

AAET
Astrological Association of East Tennessee. ``Welcome, Fellow Seekers!''

AAETS
American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress. Is that pronounced ``eats''? That's what I does when I is stressed. Or is it ``ates''? I wisheds they explaineds this -- it's beginning to freak me out!!!

``A multidisciplinary network of professionals who are committed to the advancement of intervention for survivors of trauma. The Academy aims to identify expertise among professionals, across disciplines, and to provide meaningful standards for those who regularly work with survivors. Today, the Academy's international membership includes individuals from over 200 professions in the health-related fields, emergency services, criminal justice, forensics, law, business and education. With members in every state of the United States and over 45 foreign countries, the Academy is now the largest organization of its kind in the world.''

(Is D.C. counted among states or foreign countries?)

AAETS defines traumatic stress as ``the emotional, cognitive and behavioral experience of individuals who are exposed to, or who witness, events that overwhelm their coping and problem-solving capabilities.''

Squaring the circle using only compass and straight-edge, finding the roots of a general quintic equation, expressing the indefinite integral of the Gaussian in closed form, finding a polynomial-time algorithm to solve a traveling-salesman problem, solving the quantum measurement problem, combining all four fundamental forces in a GUT. Oh yeah, I'm a survivor. (See Eric Zorn's report at the FLT entry.)

``Traumatic stress has many `faces.' In addition to the devastating effects of large-scale disasters and catastrophes, the Academy is committed to fostering a greater appreciation of the effects of day-to-day traumatic experiences (e.g., chronic illness, accidents, domestic violence and loss [and nonintegrability]). Our aim is to help all victims to become survivors and, ultimately, thrivers.''

AAF
Advanced Authoring Format. It's a ``multimedia file format that enables content creators to easily exchange digital media and metadata across platforms.'' So shouldn't that be the Advanced Co-authoring Format? It seems someone may have noticed the problem; during the first quarter or so of 2007, the AAF Association, Inc. (AAFA) became the AMWA (Advanced Media Workflow Association). Considering the groups involved, this seems to be of interest to television-related people and therefore almost inconceivably boring.

AAF
Affordable Art Fair. The idea is that no one should have to pay more than $5000 to have a nice piece of abstract, meaningless, pretentious crap to display at home. ``AF is the place for new and established collectors to discover and buy paintings, drawings, sculptures, video, photography and limited edition prints from distinguished galleries, all priced from $100 - $5000. This year [2007] the Fair will host more than 60 galleries with approximately a quarter of the exhibitors from Europe, Canada and South America.''

It is well known among artists that the way to get your work in the public eye and establish your name as you're starting out is to give your work away for free to established collectors. They then turn around and lend it for free to galleries. (Galleries would never display work that an artist tried to fob off on them directly. After all, curators have taste and perception, and one thing that just screams bad taste is giving it away for free.) That's one way the rich get richer and the poor poorer, but the real salt in the wound is that the poor have no place to display this ugly stuff except their own homes.

AAF
Alien Ant Farm. Their web pages advertise DVD's and talk about record labels and about being artists. I've never heard their stuff, but I'm sure it's music to some ears.

AAF
American Advertising Federation. They're trying to buy a good reputation. There ought to be money in flattering that vanity; check out their ``College Connection.''

Remember, the escape key turns off moving gifs (in Netscape, anyway).

They have

  1. ADDY awards,
  2. an Advertising Hall of Achievement, and
  3. an Advertising Hall of Shame, er, Fame.
If blots on the escutcheon are anything like those on ordinary cloth, these correspond to
  1. remove with water,
  2. remove with bleach,
  3. remove with scissors.

The Hall of Achievement is for those under forty, and the Hall of Shame is for those who are dead or soon will be (``[t]hose men and women who have completed their primary careers''). The Hall of Shame is unusually repulsive, as befits AAF.

``Upon induction into the Advertising Hall of Fame, each honoree receives a `Golden Ladder' trophy signifying membership in the Advertising Hall of Fame. This trophy, designed by the late Bill Bernbach, carries an inscription created by the late Tom Dillon, both of whom are members of the Hall of Fame.'' Both indeed.

The inscription: ``If we can see further, it is because we stand on the rungs of a ladder built by those who came before us.'' This inscription is a perfect epitome (epitomy) of advertising crassness. Firstly, because like typical advertising copy it is derivative. Specifically, it is derived from an expression that dates back at least to the twelfth century. The original form involves seeing further by standing on the shoulders of giants (midgets seeing further in the standard versions). Secondly, because it is clumsy. (I'll come back later and express as elegantly as possible the inelegance of Dillon's locution. Now I have to move the computer.)

AAF
American Architectural Foundation. It ``educates individuals and communities about the power of architecture to transform lives and improve the places where we live, learn, work, and play.'' AAF has teamed with Target in ``Great Schools by Design,'' a ``national initiative to improve the quality of America's schools and communities.''

Target stores are right rectangular prisms with a minimum of windows or architectural interest. They make the average 1940's brick schoolhouse look like a cathedral. A common quick orientation to some engineering disciplines not unrelated to architecture: civil engineering makes targets, mechanical and aerospace engineering destroys them. The thought that this might not be a bad thing withal was expressed by John Betjeman in 1937, with Slough as the contemplated target. (This was not John Bunyan's parabolic Slough of Despond, but instead a hyperbolic Slough for desponding of in a real England.)

AAF
American Armoured Foundation, Inc. Why isn't that ``armored''? There's an AAF Tank Museum in Danville, Virginia; I'm not sure what the AAF comprises besides the museum.

AAFA
Advanced Authoring Format Association, Inc. Often partially abbreviated as ``AAF Association.'' During the first quarter of 2007, AAFA became the AMWA.

AAFA
Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America.

AAFC
Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. AAC in French.

AAFC
All America Football Conference. A professional football league that operated for four seasons (1946-1949). Their teams included the Baltimore Colts (which only started up in 1947), (they replaced) the Miami Seahawks (which folded after one the first season), a Buffalo team that was known as the Bisons (1946) and (the first time the name was used by a pro football team) the Bills (1947-9), the Chicago Rockets (name changed to Hornets for 1949), Cleveland Browns, Los Angeles Dons, and the San Francisco Forty-Niners.

Two teams -- the New York Yankees and the Brooklyn Dodgers, took the names of existing local baseball teams (see Dodgers). What makes this unusually confusing is that there were just previously, or would soon be later, NFL teams with the same (or similar) baseball-team names. But first some general history...

With the end of the post-war boom in 1948, the AAFC could not sustain its battle with the NFL, and scrappy AAFC Commissioner Kessing -- I'm sorry, that was AAFC Commissioner Scrappy Kessing -- sought terms. At the end of the '49 season, the NFL merged-in three teams from the AAFC -- the Cleveland Browns, the San Francisco 49ers, and the Baltimore Colts -- and held a special draft for players from the four other surviving AAFC teams.

The Colts francise folded after one season (1950) in the NFL and the 49ers endured many lean years, but the Browns, which had dominated the AAFC and won all four AAFC titles, went on to win the 1950 NFL title against the LA Rams (formerly of Cleveland) in Cleveland. Cleveland continued to be dominant in the NFL, though less overwhelmingly than in the AAFC.

Now about those NYC-area teams... The NFL's Brooklyn Dodgers changed name to the Tigers for 1944 (please don't ask me about Detroit) and merged with the Boston Yanks for 1945. The owner of the defunct NFL Brooklyn Dodgers/Tigers became a founder of the AAFC and owner of the AAFC Brooklyn Dodgers in 1946.

For 1946-1948, there were two AAFC teams in the five boroughs: the New York Yankees and the sorry Brooklyn Dodgers. The Brooklyn Dodgers baseball team was eventually offered a chance to buy their ailing namesake but passed. For 1949, AAFC Dodgers merged with the stronger local AAFC team to become the Brooklyn-New York Yankees, the same year that the NFL's Boston Yanks moved and became the New York Bulldogs. With the folding of the AAFC, the Bulldogs changed their name back in 1950, becoming the New York Yanks.

It happens that the first regular-season game ever played by the San Francisco Forty-Niners (and the first played by a California pro football team) was a 21-17 loss to the (AAFC) New York Yankees in September 8, 1946. In 1950, with the AAFC Yankees defunct and many of the players distributed by draft to other NFL teams, the San Francisco Forty-Niners played their first regular season game in the NFL on September 17 -- a 21-17 loss to the New York Yanks.

The NFL's Yanks did poorly and were sold to a group in Dallas, where they failed by midseason (1951, I think) as the NFL's Texans. They stayed on the road for the rest of the season and went to Baltimore for 1952 to become the new Baltimore Colts. Don't hold me to the precise years, or names or anything, 'cause I just blew a brain gasket.

Someday when you're older and have plenty of spare RAM, I'll tell you about the White Soxes.

AAFP
American Academy of Family Physicians. They also offer a site with ``health information for the whole family.''

AAFP
American Academy of Fixed Prosthodontics. ``The Academy consists of over 500 specialists around the world, dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge, truth, and competency in research, in teaching, and in the clinical practice of crown and bridge prosthodontics.'' Dentures.

AAFP
American Academy of Forensic Psychology.

AAFP
American Association of Feline Practitioners (of veterinary medicine).

AAFPRS
American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery. You know, with a little nip here and a tuck there, I could make a much more attractive and youthful-looking acronym for you. It's not about vanity, you know: it's simply good business sense. Your organization name is the face you present to the world; you'd be amazed how a pretty face draws customers. It makes you wonder what you're really selling.

AAFTE
Average Annual Full-Time Equivalent (students registered). A SUNY-specific acronym, apparently. More are explained at the end of this document.

A.A.G.
Afdeling Agrarische Geschiedenis. Dutch `Department of Agrarian History.' See A.A.G. Bijdragen.

AAG
Association of American Geographers. Everyone agrees that it was founded in 1904 in Philadelphia, but no one explains why. Did it have to do with the San Francisco earthquake (1906), the Russian-Japanese war, Einstein's special theory of relativity?

A constituent society of the ACLS since 1941. ACLS has an overview.

AAGBI
Association of Anaesthetists of Great Britain and Ireland.

A.A.G. Bijdragen
A.A.G. Bijdragen. `[Department of Agrarian History] Contributions,' a journal published approximately annually by the A.A.G. (the department whose name is abbreviated in the journal title) at Wageningen UR. It's a monograph series, usually one per year, in Dutch (usually with an English summary).

AAGL
American Association of Gynecologic Laparoscopists. Publishes a journal.

AAGPBL
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. It iexisted from 1943 to 1954. It is now defunct. And if they were to bring it back now they wouldn't use the word girls.

AAGPBL PA
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Players' Association. Not defunct.

AAGR
Average Annual Growth Rate.

AAGS
American Association of Geodetic Surveying. Member organization of the American Congress on Surveying and Mapping (ACSM).

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AAH
Association of Ancient Historians. With members like Herodotus and Thucydides? No... historians of antiquity, not from it. You know, like tuna that tastes good, not tuna with good taste. There's a directory of Ancient Historians in the USA in Canada.

AAH
Australian Academy of Humanities.

AAHA
American Academy of Healthcare Attorneys. I'm hurt! Quick -- get me a personal injury lawyer! It's an emergency: call an ambulance chaser!

Phew! Okay, now that I'm convalescing I'll be needing a malpractice specialist.

AAHA
American Animal Hospital Association. (The link is to a website aimed mostly at veterinarians, with conference information and such. The AAHA also has a healthypet.com website with information for pet owners.)

AAHA
American Association of Homes for the Aging. Now AAHSA.

AAHAM
American Association of Healthcare Administrative Management. Ah-- ahem, we'd like a word with you about your bill.

According to a partner organization, it ``is the premier professional organization in healthcare administrative management. AAHAM was founded in 1968 as the American Guild of Patient Account Management. Initially formed to serve the interests of hospital patient account managers, AAHAM has evolved into a national membership association that represents a broad-based constituency of healthcare professionals.''

AAHC
American Association for History and Computing.

AAHC
You say you wanted the Association of Academic Health Centers? That's the AHC.

AAHE
American Association for Health Education. One of six national associations within the AAHPERD.

AAHE
American Association for Higher Education. Take another drag if you're not high enough yet.

The AAHE has been described as ``kind of like the Association of American Colleges but with a higher pulse rate.'' Hmmm -- interesting metaphor. On March 24, 2005, AAHE Board of Directors announced that ``the Association will cease operations later this year.

In a statement to AAHE members, board chair Bernadine Chuck Fong, president of Foothill College, said, Despite vigorous efforts, president Clara M. Lovett and the board concluded that the organization no longer has the resources to continue its historic leadership role in higher education.

`The spirit of AAHE must and will continue,' said Dr. Lovett, adding that plans are under way to continue the Association's work in Assessment, the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, Electronic Portfolios, Campus Program, and other initiatives under the leadership of other associations and academic institutions. She said that discussions are already under way with the Lumina Foundation concerning relocation of the BEAMS (Building Engagement and Atta